Opponents of the $1.45 billion hospital deal between HCA/ Health One and the Colorado Health Foundation are suing state Attorney General John Suthers for approving the deal, and asking Denver District Court to throw out the already-completed pact.

A group of former board members with the joint venture that used to operate metro Denver’s largest hospital group say Suthers should have ruled that the deal violated a hospital-transfer law and either altered it radically or thrown out the sale.

The Colorado Health Foundation fundamentally altered its binding mission when it sold its 40 percent business ownership of seven hospitals to its for-profit partner, HCA/HealthOne, the suit claims. The Nashville, Tenn.-based for- profit chain closed the $1.45 billion purchase immediately after Suthers announced last month his analysis that state law didn’t block the deal. Suthers did ask the parties to stiffen community protections as part of the deal, including extending the time HealthOne would commit to caring for Medicare and Medicaid patients and avoid closing hospitals.

The opponents, working with sympathetic local attorneys, have warned for months that the deal gave up important community checks on the vital hospital institutions. They say HealthOne cannot be trusted to work for the public and that the nonprofit foundation should keep its stake, which included half of the controlling board seats.

HealthOne, for its part, has said it always intended to continue providing extensive uncompensated care and run graduate programs for medical students. The foundation said it wanted to diversify its large endowment away from relying on hospital profits to fund community grants in the health field. Before the deal, the joint venture ran seven hospitals and many other facilities, including Rose, Swedish, Sky Ridge and Presbyterian/ St. Luke’s.

Both HealthOne and the Colorado Health Foundation declined to comment. Attorney general’s spokesman Mike Saccone said Suthers was confident his decision would hold up.

Michael Booth was a health care & health policy writer at The Denver Post before departing in 2013. He started his journalism career as an assistant foreign editor at The Washington Post before moving with family to Denver and taking a brief stint with the Denver Business Journal. During a 25-year career at The Post, he covered city and state politics, droughts, entertainment and wrote Sunday takeouts, and was part of two Pulitzer Prize-winning teams for breaking news coverage.